


Tantalus and the Cryptic Courtship

by nonky



Category: Nancy Drew (TV 2019)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-04
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:42:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23016445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonky/pseuds/nonky
Summary: If he'd stopped to guess who he was letting into his house, Carson would have said at least fifty names before Owen Marvin made the list. The young businessman was too old for Nancy, and he wasn't clear on how they'd met. He knew she was fearless approaching anyone, and he hadn't heard anything particularly troubling about the Marvins that didn't apply to most of the wealthy summering families. They were a small family, having lost more than half their numbers from the local branch. The business seemed profitable, and their projects scandal-free.Spoilers up to episode 1x13.
Relationships: Carson Drew/Nancy Drew, Nancy Drew/Owen Marvin
Kudos: 22
Collections: Nancy Drew TV Series (2019)





	Tantalus and the Cryptic Courtship

Carson Drew was still trying to come down from the adrenaline of being in prison and then suddenly out. He was jittery and his appetite was minimal, a situation relative safety wasn't helping. Periodically he had to wonder at the success of Ace's plan, though he didn't like himself for questioning the young man's ingenuity. It was just strange to think of himself breaking the law so openly. 

He was grateful to be alive and unharmed. Being at home with Nancy was a relief, though it did leave him open to her questions. She had been pale and her hair was wet from rain that hadn't fallen when she arrived home. It had been a little shameful facing her with an ankle monitor, but at least they were together to stand up to the Hudsons. Being around might allow him to push her to eat and sleep better. 

He had watched her run out to the Historical Society with an odd urgency. Nancy was known for her impulsive moments, but that exit was very abrupt. She was only gone for a short time before she arrived home. Her frown was troubled, and she seemed to have used up all her energy. She excused herself upstairs to shower, and he was surprised to hear a knock on the front door. He had plans with his attorney the next day, but even she had agreed to give him an evening to get his bearings. Any guest had to be there for Nancy.

She had a small group of loyal friends Carson thought she was slowly learning to trust. He'd been upset about Nick, but the young man was good to her. He had a solid read on Nancy's desperation, and even better instincts about when she needed backup despite her preference to work alone. 

If he'd stopped to guess who he was letting into his house, Carson would have said at least fifty names before Owen Marvin made the list. The young businessman was too old for Nancy, and he wasn't clear on how they'd met. He knew she was fearless approaching anyone, and he hadn't heard anything particularly troubling about the Marvins that didn't apply to most of the wealthy summering families. They were a small family, having lost more than half their numbers from the local branch. The business seemed profitable, and their projects scandal-free.

A nodding acquaintance wasn't the same as any real information. Owen had his head down texting with a worried look on his face. Carson wondered what had gone on during his few weeks away. He knew Nick and Nancy weren't together, but only by vague context when Nancy mentioned him as part of the group. 

"Hi, can I help you?"

Owen looked up with a little jolt, and his eyes went wide. He pocketed his phone very quickly and forced a smile. "Hello, Mr. Drew. I, uh, was expecting Nancy to answer. But I'm glad you're - at home. I know she worried for you," he said, deftly speaking around the awkward moment. "I'm Owen Marvin. Nancy and I met over the summer and I've been checking on her while she's been living alone."

Superficially that was a nice thought, as nonsensical as it was with even the tiniest pressure to the surface of the lie. The Marvins and Drews weren't close. It would be less shocking to find Ryan or Celia Hudson taking an interest in being good neighbours. They wouldn't be acting from good intentions, but there was a logic to their interest.

The obvious answer was most worrying. Owen was pursuing Nancy, and they might be dating. It wasn't the disaster it could have been. His reputation with Pinehill Construction was new and he had never been married. The modest age difference was more of a father's worry than a real problem. It was still wildly visible from his body language he'd been expecting an empty house or privacy with Nancy, not an introduction to her father. 

"Sure, I recognize you," Carson said, falling back on manners to glean more information. "Come in. Nancy's upstairs but I don't think she's going to bed yet."

He watched Owen's face for guilt or embarrassment, and saw a flush before it was covered by a smile. 

"Thank you. I didn't intend a long visit. I just found a book I thought she might like," he said. His handshake was firm but not aggressive.

Gifts were interesting. It wasn't flowers or anything so obvious, but Nancy wouldn't be impressed by such impractical things. Knowledge would win her over, and Carson recalled Nancy's moral dilemma asking for help from Everett Hudson at the expense of the late Sebastian Marvin. Her hesitation had perhaps been about more than concern for the right action.

"I was glad to hear Nancy was able to help you with getting charges laid for the Bonny Scot's sinking," Carson told him. "I remember your uncle. He was generous to the town."

"I remember Uncle Sebastian genuinely liked Horseshoe Bay, at least in the summer," Owen said. "I think this might be the latest past the tourist season I've stayed."

The decision to linger might be related to finding a survivor and finally getting the Hudsons scrutinized for his family's losses. Carson also thought it might be a sign the casual, late-night visits were a bit more than a friendly gesture. For all Nancy's ability to push people away, she tended to charm some effortlessly. With deference to his fatherly pride, he liked to think of those people as the ones with better taste.

He turned away and led Owen into the house, noting the way the inner door was shut gingerly to baby the loose latch and his shoes were taken off by the door where Nancy tended to slip off her tennis shoes. He even moved to take off his jacket, but stopped himself. He'd been in the house enough to get familiar. He was more than a random source for whatever Nancy was snooping into. 

It was also pretty clear when Carson saw his daughter's quick descent down to meet them, putting herself in the middle. Her hair was untidy and damp, and she had thrown on mismatched socks. She had redressed in jeans and a sweater, and neither of them seemed designed to incite a passionate reaction. She ran out of stairs and planted an elbow awkwardly on the railing, looking between the two men bemusedly.

"Hi! Owen. I wasn't expecting you," she said. "This is my father, Carson. I guess this is your official meeting."

Her nervous edge mingled with Owen's, and the eye contact was too intense to argue down to a momentary collaboration. Nancy was obviously allowing some kind of relationship to form, and eager it not be noticed. 

It wasn't that Carson was particularly upset at the idea of Nancy dating Owen as much as he couldn't see his independent daughter being ready for serious love at that stage of her life. He wanted her to have her whole range of options open, not just the ones that allowed her to remain close to her hometown. As much as it would be nice to see her regularly, she might have a substantially better life somewhere no one knew her teenage detective career. Horseshoe Bay was very small once you had a few enemies.

"We've been at the same events a few times," Carson said mildly. "Just the nature of a small town. But it isn't really the same in a crowd. Sweetheart, I didn't know if you'd eaten today, but I found the stuff for an egg and cheese quiche. It's just a few minutes to put it in to heat up. Are either of you hungry?"

She looked toward the kitchen but shook her head. Carson got the feeling he might be guarded even more closely at home than in prison. Nancy took the last step down and gave a determined smile to show she was fine. 

"I'm fine, thanks. I don't know if Owen would like a coffee or something," she said. 

To his credit, her visitor looked dubious. He let her change the subject with a smile. 

"No, thank you. I'm just coming from a dinner, and I can't interrupt your evening too long. I know you didn't ask for a favour this time," Owen said. "I found something possibly helpful."

Carson pointed to the living room, nudging Nancy to at least let the poor man sit for a moment. He didn't know what they were, but he wasn't going to begrudge normal hospitality. "Let's not hang in the doorway. I'm going to make something hot to drink. You two can talk in the living room. Call out if you change your mind about food or coffee."

His daughter's uncharacteristic mumble was a little endearing. She was shy about her new friend. Owen nodded and let her go first with a gentlemanly step back. He had slipped a hardcover book from his pocket, and presented it to her without touching her. She immediately opened it and started scanning pages, walking into the other room. 

Carson knew he should give them space, but he would be in the kitchen and likely to hear the odd sentence of their conversation. He might as well overhear all of it and decide if Owen's visit was worth risking a fight with Nancy. He started the kettle boiling, and went back to hear them sitting down. 

"'Experiences of Preternatural Entities' published 1941, London, England. Is it ghost stories," she asked. 

"More anecdotal than that. Reports on seances and the more visible, repeatable elements of everyday hauntings. Nothing with bedsheets and chains, but the feelings of a person in the presence of something not physically there," Owen said. "Some of them were even investigated and not conclusively explained as hoaxes or real. Apparently there was a whole psychic industry that popped up around the end of the second World War, and then a bunch of psychic busters to try to keep them from taking money from grieving families."

Nancy sounded fond as she replied. "Just because it happened doesn't mean it wasn't faked by one person and then badly investigated by another person. I thought you were a skeptic."

"I'm not sure about ghosts. But back when I was adorably rotund and did not know hair was styled before you showed yourself to other people, I was a little bit of a library aficionado."

Carson winced at her borderline rude reply, though it was clearly given in the same friendly tone she'd previously directed at Owen.

"I think they call that a nerd."

The young man was clearly unmoved by blunt language, answering with a wit of his own. 

"And I reject that label. Anyway, when your summers are spent making friends with the librarian, you get to ask to see the rare books. Horseshoe Bay Public Library actually has a pretty impressive collection thanks to the number of summer millionaires who like to donate obscure items. Like I said, I believe you about what you've seen, but I don't personally understand anything about hauntings."

"Lucky you. I'm not promoting it as a lifestyle." Nancy sounded tired, her voice catching on some worry more concrete than ghosts.

"Well, that's good, because as it turns out you can choose to draw ghosts closer, but there are some side effects. Basically it's like exposing yourself to something that causes allergy symptoms. If you get a tolerance built up, your response to that thing changes. You can help your body relearn how to process it. Practice makes you better at seeing what you're seeing, instead of just feeling nervous or thinking you see something but not being able to view it by looking at it directly. The downside is exposure to ghosts leaves a sort of residue on you, makes you more noticeable to them. So if there are 50 people in a room, the ghost will find you first."

Carson had participated in a ritual to bring home Ace's soul to his body. He'd felt queasy and anxious in a very specific way he'd never experienced, but he wasn't sure how much of anything he'd felt was really so hard to explain.

"I don't know if that book holds up. My supernatural expert has been seeing ghosts since she was a child. It's made her pretty flaky as an adult. She's sane, but her coping skills are problematic for her family."

"Okay, if you were in the room with a person with more . . . lengthy tolerance to hauntings, you'd be the second person they find. Otherwise, you're more visible to them like they've become to you."

"You make that sound bad."

"Haunted is not usually a happy adjective," Owen said. "And you said your supernatural expert doesn't particularly enjoy her abilities."

"No, but they have been useful several times," she said. "We did a spirit walk here a few weeks ago when Ace was hurt. I can't prove it was what made the difference, but if it helped at all I'm glad we did."

He chuckled "You make me feel so old and boring sometimes, Drew," he said. 

"You're not that old. There's barely any visible grey hairs. Maybe it's all in your beard when you let it grow out more," she said.

"That's not very nice. See if you get any other presents soon. Hey, I didn't mess up coming here with your father around, did I?"

Carson noted his daughter's hesitation. He was willing to bet she knew he wasn't entirely above listening to her conversation when the circumstances were as odd as this one. 

"No, he's just had kind of a weird time lately. Lawyers don't do a lot of jailhouse escapes. It's discouraged professionally and it sounds like it was unplanned. Ace was kind of the mastermind of the whole thing, and even he doesn't seem clear on how it all worked out. But I only care it did."

"I'm glad it did. Hey, I'm going to leave but call me, okay?" 

"Okay."

There was a kiss length pause, and Carson strained to hear. Over his shoulder, the kettle's whistle was getting louder. He would have to miss something said to cross the room and be innocently in the kitchen before Nancy saw Owen out.

"Hey, I wouldn't let ghosts get you," the young man said, his voice softer than before. "I don't know what I'd do about it, but I'm prepared to be really persistent about it."

"Thank you, but I don't think Lucy wants to hurt me."

"All the same, don't read this before you go to sleep. There's a chapter on demons and it's just spooky."

What he might have previously written off as some flirtation didn't feel as playful as it should. Nancy was a ruthlessly logical about some things, and Carson had learned that trying to enforce rules on his smart daughter. She was spectacular at pointing out failures of good sense in parental worries. He was tempted to believe she had seen their local ghost enough to have figured out a pattern in her appearances. 

The kettle whistle was approaching a shriek, and he walked quickly to turn it off. Carson was busy stirring when Nancy and Owen walked to the front door. She touched his arm and he tipped down with unconscious willingness to the touch. Their goodbye was friendly enough, and she was still carrying the book close to her chest. 

The murmur of words continued as Nancy let Owen out and locked up behind him. She came back with a meek approach into the kitchen. "I've been spending some time with Owen Marvin," she said. "I guess I should have said something, but it didn't seem important enough to mention."

Carson nodded. "I'm not judging. He seems attached. If you're not interested it might be time to let him down easy," he said. 

Nancy looked at the book in her hands, shrugging. "I, uh, didn't expect he'd still be in town this late. He's been a good source for information. I'm trying to keep my suspicions reasonable. I've learned my lesson about that, finally."

He knew she was feeling guilty and wouldn't be convinced it wasn't a major problem. Murder accusations typically didn't blow over with no consequences. Carson couldn't explain the space his child occupied in his life. She was irreplaceable, and could never do something ugly enough to love her less. 

"I never wanted you to be a different person, Nancy," he said. "I never thought you meant to get me arrested. If you're going to make lists of evidence on people, I would suggest you choose a drawer in your desk and install a lock."

His cagey daughter smiled ruefully. "Definitely on my list. I'm glad you're home, Dad."

Her hug was warm and he decided to ignore her lack of answers about Owen Marvin.


End file.
